England's best kept secret

Remember when Rookpot used to pride itself on being friendly and welcoming? Cosmopolitan? The gateway to Farynshire? We’re done with that now.

Indiscriminately ousting any and all opposition from positions of authority and power? I’m sure this has been done elsewhere in history, and never with good results!

And opposition to what, in this case? The other Peoples?

I don’t think it’s controversial to say that Geirolf and the Bloon Peaks Clan initially extended a hand (paw?) of friendship. Instead of seizing it, Sayce and his Council responded with suspicion and ultimately hostility. And it has culminated in this:

Geirolf’s own son, Botolf, acting as an ambassador for the wolvern, was expelled from Rookpot just weeks after the Disemployment. He was escorted down the tor by no less than six Appeasers and ordered not to return to the city. It wasn’t stated what would happen if he did return.

The reason for this? The official statement from the Office of the First Councillor is that with wolvern relation worsening in the mountains it was “unsafe” (my sarcastic quote marks) to continue to allow Blaeze’s brother free reign in Rookpot.

How will this be received by Geirolf and, in particular, Blaeze? Sayce et al are focussed on Rookpot – but the decisions they make in the city will have massive ramifications across the whole county.

Before Geirolf and his sons came to Rookpot, there had been no contact between the Peoples (or at least, between humans and the other Peoples) for over a hundred years. We’ve always known that there were wolvern in the mountains, seafolk in the ocean, and that Oes and Gnivil were home to foresteens. Probably most of us thought these were folk tales, kept alive by the tourist board and old village folk. Or at least that’s what we wanted to think. Because there was always enough evidence to prove the existence of the Peoples. But they were just part of Farynshire in the same way that Musril and the mountains are.

But now that the Bloon Peaks Clan want a relationship with the humans of Rookpot – well, that changes everything. Everyone has seen the wolvern on television, meeting the Council, wandering around the city streets. Botolf himself was a familiar sight in the centre of Rookpot, as he got to know our city and acted as his father’s representative. He answered questions, posed for photographs, and was genuinely curious about human life. It was endearing to see this gentle giant (when standing on his hind legs Botolf reaches an impressive six foot eight inches in height, and wolvern can look quite fierce to those that don’t know them) surrounded by initially wary – but later fearless – groups of children who all wanted to touch him and speak with him. I wonder what those children will be thinking when they hear that their wolvern friend has been thrown out of the city.

We will endeavour to find out what is happening in the mountains.

In the meantime, Botolf will be missed. And I, for one, fear the consequences of his expulsion.

These travelblogs were written by Mabel Govitt before all the changes in Rookpot. I’m going to continue to publish them as a reminder of what joy Farynshire once was, and the hope it can be again. Ammaceadda

As we took over an entire table in the carriage, Felix flicked through Walking and Wine in the Bloon Peaks that he had bought in the Beech.

“We have to go to a vineyard,” he said. “And they grow citrus fruits in some places, so there are lemon and orange groves.”

“I’m surprised they get enough sun for that.”

Felix shrugged. “They must do: I don’t think any of it is grown in greenhouses. And I have to get some honey. They sell honey from the mountains in Rookpot, and I’d love to talk to the beekeepers about it. A lot of the cakes in Lacey’s have mountain honey in them.”

“Does it say anything about the best place to try and see wolvern?” I asked.

Felix looked up wolvern in the index at the back of the book. “I think we need to go further in to the mountains,” he said, after glancing at the relevant pages. “Or maybe ask in one of the local pubs if anyone has seen one. I doubt we’ll see any, though – it’s not like they’re just running through the forests.”

“We’d should try, though.”

And thus the duel quests of our Tour were established. Felix’s mission was to explore the many and varied local culinary delights Farynshire had to offer, and mine was the county’s rich culture and history.

I hadn’t really thought about the Peoples themselves when planning this trip, but we were going to the mountains, the forests and the coast – we might see wolvern, foresteens and seafolk. Felix said he had never seen a seafolken – and he had grown up right by the sea.

The only individuals I had met who said they had seen any of the Peoples were guest speakers and presenters on my course. The Peoples were elusive to the point of becoming semi-mythical. Everyone knew that they were out there, or had been at some point, but few had ever seen a live one. There were academics at the university who had built their careers around studying one or more of the Peoples, and all of them had given talks on our Local History module. But, from what other Professors hinted at, these academics and their chosen areas of interest were not highly thought of in academia: they were seen as chasing myths and legends, rumours and fairytales. But I, as an outsider, found the Peoples fascinating, and was convinced we would see packs of wolvern, groves of foresteens, and … shoals (?) of seafolk.

The train bounced gently along through the lush green countryside. The sky was a clear blue dome, the thick grass rippled in waves in the soft breeze, the meadows were full of wild flowers vibrant with celebratory colour. We rushed passed a couple of fields filled with new red and violet poppies. Small woods dotted the fields, and clear slow moving streams sparkled in the distance. Occasionally we could see the distant blue wall of the mountains when the train came to a bend. This was a direct train to Hen Ffydd so there was no stopping at the tiny villages we blared through – a good thing too, otherwise we might have been tempted to get out and wander around.

The plan was to spend a couple of days in the mountains, not going any further than the Bloon Peaks. We would stay in a B&B in Hen Fffydd, the last station on the line. The train should pull in during late afternoon.

If you only read the newspapers or watched Rookpot Today (and, to be fair, had only started doing both fairly recently) you’d be forgiven for thinking that Rookpot was under constant and brutal attack by packs of vicious wolvern.

I can reassure you that this is not the case.

We always said we wanted to keep our sources and reporters anonymous to protect them from the First Councillor’s Appeasers, but our source for this post explicitly asked us to name him. The information in this post comes straight from Botolf ken Geirolf os okto.

Botolf is the son of Geirolf, Leader of the Bloon Peaks Clan, who came in peace, reconciliation and hope to visit our Council. You’ve probably seen him on the News.

I should provide a little more context for our non-Farynshire readers.

Wolvern

Like the foresteens and seafolk, the wolvern are often regarded as Peoples of myth and legend. They live in the Daggerrock Mountain range that borders the county of Farynshire from the rest of England.

They are quite real. The wolvern were the last of the Peoples to break contact with Rookpot. They retreated into the Daggerrock Mountains at the start of the twentieth century, long after the foresteens and seafolk had given up on us. Representatives from each of the Peoples used to sit on Rookpot Council, and those seats have remained symbolically empty for over a hundred years (there are rumours Sayce has had these seats removed). There are photos and newspaper clippings, even some very shaky black and white footage, of the last Council Meeting attended by wolvern. Despite what the Tourist Board have long insinuated, these artefacts are completely genuine.

This is why it was something of a shock to a lot of people when wolvern showed up in Rookpot a few months ago. And now it’s hard to believe that we ever doubted their existence.

To look upon, wolvern resemble wolves – inasmuch as they have fur, wolfish heads, claws and a tail. But they are not wolves. And when you see one in the flesh they don’t really look much like wolves.

Rookpot Museum had a wonderful exhibition called The Cold Earth dedicated to wolvern just as Sayce took office. It displayed everyday items from wolvern society brought back by the expedition teams, and artefacts gifted to the city by Geirolf. It provided a great insight into the make up of wolvern society – or, at least, the Bloon Peaks Clan, and Geirolf assures us that other wolvern Clans are also led by a Leader and have quite a strict hierarchal society. They are quite a spiritual people, believing in three Fates that can act as guides throughout life and ultimately control all destinies. If they have any religion it revolves around these Fates. They extensively mine the mountains in which they live, and the exhibition had some beautiful examples of wolvern jewellery and decoration. Of course, when Sayce came to power the exhibition was closed down. And I think anyone who worked on it was Disemployed.

They speak a variant Musril – which got scholars and academics very excited. Musril is Farynshire’s language, mainly spoken (by humans) in Riversouth, but now we know that the other Peoples speak it too. It’s a communal language allowing us all to communicate. What do the foresteen and seafolk variants sound like?

Of massacres

So, we had two.

One involved the cult of our previous First Councillor. He and his – let’s call them associates (because, honestly, I don’t know the correct term) – were killed in their country mansion just outside Rookpot. The papers called it the Red Room of Death. The perpetrators were never caught. The motives were never established beyond, well, cult. And, truth be told, we don’t really need to discuss it much here when we’re interested in wolvern. But it is necessary to mention because it directly affects how we dealt with the wolvern. And, bizarrely, it happened just a few days after the other massacre.

This second massacre involved about fifteen wolvern at Rookpot Train Station, and is known as the Train Station Massacre. These were the first wolvern to set foot in Rookpot since before the First World War. No one knew why they were there, what they wanted, or how they had died – though it looked like a violent and bloody death from the pictures on the news.

No one knows – still – who or what carried out those twin massacres. Although suspicion has fallen upon the creature that flew out of the Gorge just before First Councillor Sayce took office (I’ll write about that shortly).

So all of this craziness (and I’ve given you the bare bones, really) led to Rookpot having no Council, and the wolvern wanting answers for the deaths of so many of their Clan in a human city.

Enter Geirolf.

He arrived with his sons, Blaeze and Botolf , not for recrimination or blame, but for understanding and with the possibility of friendship. He met with the interim Council (as this was just before the First Councillor elections). They seemed to get on well. Geirolf and his sons attended Council meetings, appeared in the local press, visited around the city, and gifts were exchanged. Botolf stayed in Rookpot and a delegation from the Museum went to the Bloon Peaks Clan in the mountains as a sort of cultural exchange. It really did seem like we could re-establish relations with the wolvern.

But then a couple of things happened.

I should stress again how both Geirolf and Botolf wanted nothing but peace and friendship between their Clan and Rookpot. Botolf is learning English, and cooperating totally with the Musril academics’ research – they love him! But Blaeze, Geirolf’s older son, was more interested in finding out who was to blame for the deaths of the wolvern at the train station. He also brought up the very old grievance of land “stolen” by humans that should rightfully belong to the wolvern (this is the larger issue of human expansion into the mountains, into wolvern territory), and he wanted the Council to address this. Even though he was aggressive and demanding, it seemed likely that he could have been talk down or mollified by his father, brother, the liaison staff at the Museum, and the interim Council. Botolf is confident that his brother holds a minority view within the Clan, and that the rest of the wolvern Geirolf spoke for were more curious than aggressive toward humans.

But then Rigel Sayce was elected First Councillor.

He had campaigned on an, if not anti, then definitely suspicious of wolvern platform. And his loud and tubthumping rhetoric fuelled Blaeze’s antagonism further. Things came to a head during a Council Meeting. Geirolf had already returned to the Bloon Peaks, and Botolf was unable to calm his brother down. And there was nobody to restrain the new First Councillor either. The row ended with Sayce insisting he would never consider any old claims for land in the mountains, let alone wolvern claims, and then he had Blaeze thrown out of Rookpot.

And that is where we are now. There have been no wolvern attacks on Rookpot, or any other human towns or cities, despite the reports coming out from the Office of the First Councillor.

Everyone who wants to establish good relations with the wolvern (and are hopeful that this can lead on to establishing communication with the seafolk and foresteens) is hopeful Geirolf can keep Blaeze’s wilder impulses in check. The real issue is: who is going to keep the First Councillor and his advisers in check?

Rookpot Today and Rookpot News are reporting that First Councillor Rigel Sayce has issued a decree “disemploying” academics from the university and staff working in the Council Chambers.

According to a Council statement, read out by a representative from the reputable law form, Whittaker and Piper, the action was taken against thirty one academics and twenty five Council employees for propagating lies and mis-truths regarding the re-establishment of relations between Rookpot and the wolvern Clans (although at this stage the only Clan to have sent representatives to Rookpot is the Bloon Peaks Clan).

We have not seen the statement, but some quotes that appeared in the media include:

“We need a united stance to deal with this unprecedented contact with a species alien to our own … At this time we cannot afford disunity and frivolous debate …”

“Funding needs to be directed to approved research and rigorous investigation at this crucial time … Academics and researchers are encouraged to take this opportunity to apply for funds for research, and are encouraged to approach the new Council Department, the Office for Inquiry Mandate, with their proposals and ideas …”

“ … The First Councillor has taken the bold and brave decision to re-structure the Council Chambers to become a true public-serving service, representing the united front we present to outsiders …”

Yeah … a lot of bureaucraticspeak there, folks.

According to the reports, the affected “disemployed” were told at the start of the day that their services were no longer required. More than a few were forcibly escorted from their offices by the First Councillor’s new Appeasers.

The Schools most affected in the university are the School of Farynshire and its People and the School of Research, Myth and Legend. The Council Departments where most staff have been removed from are the Civic House and the Tourism Office. The Office of the Seal has been closed down completely.

As of yet none of the newly vacant positions have been filled. There is no word as to whether they ever will be.

There are demonstrations in Dameg Square against this action – and we will be joining the protestors. Numerous law suits are being filed against wrongful dismissal. But the Council’s law form is Whittaker and Piper – so I, for one, hold out no hope of any success in this area – but we will continue to report on the attempts, at least.

reallyThese travelblogs were written by Mabel Govitt before all the changes in Rookpot. I’m going to continue to publish them as a reminder of what joy Farynshire once was, and the hope it can be again.

Ammaceadda

I realise we are already three posts into our Grand Tour and we haven’t left Rookpot. I promise we will! But we have to quickly stop off at EassenBren first.

If Dameg Square is the administrative and cultural centre of the city (and the county), EassenBren is its artistic heart.

It sits on a slope. The Raven Theatre overlooks the Square from its elevated position. It has been inspired by the temples of Ancient Greece, but each classical pillar is a bright block of colour: rich purple, blood red, sky blue, sun yellow, lime green. On either side of it down the slope are two rows of very different buildings.

On one side is a terrace of five storey, pastel coloured Georgian houses, with baskets on chains hanging outside the front doors that pedestrians have to duck to avoid. The baskets are full of geraniums, peonies and sometimes herbs. These face the artists’ workshops: protected by a long roof covered in slate tiles. The smells of oils, paints and clays waft around the Square.

In the middle of the Square is EassenBren’s fountain. Dameg’s fountain was designed by an architect who really liked black oblongs. EassenBren’s is a perpetual work in progress. It is an evergrowing collection of earthen artworks produced by the craftsmen in the covered workshops. Every artist creates a small figurine, usually a grotesque caricature of themselves, which is placed in the fountain. There are also some larger pieces loitering near or in the water. A carpet of coins from all over the world and from different eras glint under the water.

Felix headed straight for The Lilac Beech.

This is the lavender building in the middle of the Georgian terrace. A faded wooden sign, adorned with what looks like a peeling painting of a bunch of grapes but is more probably a peeling painting of a tree, hangs over the door. The large cross-latticed windows display piles of pristine books, and posters advertising upcoming events. As Felix pushed the door open the bell above us tinkled and we were hit by the smell of new books.

The ground floor of the shop is open plan with displays scattered throughout. Every wall is lined with books, floor to ceiling, except at the far end where there is a large fireplace, occupied by a huge earthen pot filled with rose and lily petals in the summer. It was surrounded by squashy armchairs, wingback chairs, and a few beanbags. The children’s area is on the far side of the shop from the fireplace, strewn with cardboard books and toys on colourful fluffy rugs. Rising up from the middle of the shop is a wrought iron staircase wound tight like a corkscrew. The door to the courtyard at the back of the shop was open to let the warm summer sun in.

It was tempting to sit by the cool fireplace, browse a few books, and maybe have a cup of sweet tea, but we had a train to catch.

Felix bought Walking and Wine in the Bloon Peaks, The Living Forests, and Meyricks, Musril and Mermaids – all useful guides for where we were going.

There was no need for us to rush. Our train would not depart for another twenty minutes.

I think the best way – certainly the most dramatic way – to leave Rookpot is via The Drop, which helpfully also leads down to the train station.

On maps, The Drop is Newton Hill, the steepest street in the city. There are handrails on either pavement to help pedestrians stay upright. There are frequent petitions to the Council to have a chairlift installed, but this is not considered a good use of public money, and would negatively impact upon the medieval aesthetics; and besides, exercise was good for people. I do feel for anyone who has to work on The Drop, though, especially the baristas at Lacey’s, the coffee shop that sits at the top, looking straight down the hill.

We decided we had time to get an iced bun from Lacey’s. The important thing about the buns is not the flavour – often not discernible beyond sweet and bordering on sickening – but the colour. You can request any colour of icing. Felix chose turquoise; I always had forest green.

Walking down The Drop with dignity takes practice. I will strongly advise now, though no one will heed my heartfelt warning, not to attempt this whilst drunk, no matter how much money is involved in the dare. Doing it sober is challenge enough. Those of a nervous disposition use the rail; the more experienced manage to keep upright by themselves; children run and quite often do not end up in a crying heap at the bottom. Perhaps a wiser investment than a chairlift would be crash mats at the foot of The Drop.

We landed safely enough and made our way to the grand Victorian train station, finishing off the iced buns as we boarded the train.

When Felix had said, right at the start of planning the trip, that we were going to take the long way round to his family home on the coast, he wasn’t kidding. The first place we were going to from Rookpot was the Daggerrock Mountains – in the exact opposite direction from the coast.

These travelblogs were written by Mabel Govitt before all the changes in Rookpot. I’m going to continue to publish them as a reminder of what joy Farynshire once was, and the hope it can be again.

Ammaceadda

The most famous city in Farynshire, possibly the only place anyone over the mountains has heard of, is Rookpot.

It sprawls over a steep tor that is cut in two by a deep dark gorge, along the bottom of which flow the cold waters of the Darkflint River.

When people think of Rookpot it’s the gorge that cuts the tor in half that comes to mind. Then it’s the Squares surrounded by cobbled streets and Cuts. This medieval heart of the city is great to explore: there’s always a new boutique, gallery or bookstore to discover in the warren of narrow alleys that no car could ever get through. That’s the other thing everyone notices: all the bikes, scooters, and lately segues and blades – because these are the only modes of transport that can go everywhere in the city. Buses have to skirt the outside of the medieval centre in the wider modern roads built. Trains come in at the city’s only station, at the base of the tor. We had decided that this is how we would leave Rookpot.

If students are lucky they will get accommodation on Wessentor – which is the half the city with the Squares, history and night life. Felix and I had been in halls at the bottom of Wessentor, in our first year, which is where we had met. In our second year we had had to move and the only affordable place we could find was on Eassentor. Eassentor is not a bad place to live or anything, but it’s just so ordinary compared to what’s over the gorge. There are streets of terraced houses on Wessentor’s lower slopes, as well as some discreet luxury apartments near the centre, and the very expensive villas close to the summit of the tor. But most Rookpotians lived in the dull suburbia on Eassentor, which was encroaching slowly and inevitably off the tor and into the countryside below.

Neither of us wanted to leave Rookpot from Eassentor. So, with our backpacks making us look like tourists in our own city, we made our way across one of the many bridges that span the gorge, and went to Dameg Square.

Dameg Square is the centre of Rookpot in every sense. It is halfway up the tor and the gorge cuts through its ancient cobbles and the neat rectangle of grass that is crowded in the summer and muddy in the winter.

I have spent a lot of time in this Square. The Museum, with its wide white steps, and the Library stand next to each other, and face the ancient Cathedral (the foundations of which were laid in the thirteenth century) and the Council Chambers. The green in the centre of the Square is home to a solitary oak tree that seemed to be dead for all of the time I had been at university; it is bent almost double, long branches dangling down into the gorge.

The Square is always busy, night or day. We bought slushes from Rhewogydd, whose pink van chugging on the edge of the gorge is a sure sign of summer. Rhewogydd had been providing ice slushes to the Council workers, families, tourists, and students hustling through Dameg Square for at least twenty five years. His ever-growing menu is bound in a novel-sized tome. I recommend the cherry and rum for pure velvet indulgence, but if you want refreshing coolness on a sweltering hot day – and you don’t fancy jumping into the fountain – you have to go with mint and cucumber.

We sat on the wide Museum steps to drink our slushes and people-watched. It was a hot day in June so the bustle was a little fatigued, except in the fountain where children and students splashed. The office workers, shirt sleeves rolled up to their elbows, ties untied, looked like they were having the least fun during their brief escape from their offices.

A story time event had just finished in the Library, and the parents with prams were milling about outside, the adults chattering loudly, their small children chasing each other around in the safety of the Square. When I had first arrived in Rookpot as a fresher I had been horrified at the sight of small children – or drunk students, or Council workers staring at their phones – shrieking and playing excitedly close to a chasm plunging hundreds of feet to a fierce river below. But I had gone completely native, and was confident that no child would fall.

There was nothing – no barrier, fence, not even cones – to stop anyone from plummeting into the gorge, yet nobody ever seemed to. Only seven people had ever died this way in the whole history of the city. The gorge was narrow in Dameg Square, and brazen Rookpotians casually jumped from Eassentor to Wessentor on their way to work, hardly breaking their stride.

The exhibition in the Museum was Coastal Treasures, advertised on the listless banners hanging over the steps. I had been a week before, and it was an interesting exploration of the expeditions and research focussed on the coves and beaches along Farynshire’s coast between Tropsog and Sylnmouth, and the shipwrecks and treasures that had been discovered beneath the waves. Felix was inspired to go scuba diving when we reached the coast. I was less keen, and hoped he would forget this notion by the time we reached the sea. He was also inspired to buy a few guide books, which I was much more on board with.

Sipping on our slushes, we made our way along the edge of the gorge to the Cut that linked Dameg Square with EassenBren. Rookpot was riddled with these Cuts: long, winding, red-bricked alleys lit by old iron lanterns even on a sunny summer day. This was the most famous and well-used Cut as it linked the two most important Squares.

These travelblogs were written by Mabel Govitt before all the changes in Rookpot. I’m going to continue to publish them as a reminder of what joy Farynshire once was, and the hope it can be again.

Ammaceadda

So this is the first post on this website. Big responsibility.

I should explain what’s going on.

My name is Mabel Govitt, and I’ve just graduated from Rookpot University. Last summer me and my friend decided to explore this extraordinary county. Adam Court (something to do with the Tourist Board, I think) asked us to write about our experiences in a series of blog posts. This is the first of those.

So, just before my final Musril in Context exam at the end of my final year, Felix came up with a plan.

“Mabel. Why don’t you come with me this summer? Stay at my house, meet the family.”

There was always a slightly odd emphasis on family whenever Felix spoke of the extended ap Hullin clan that seemed to occupy an entire village on the coast. Before I could scramble up an excuse, he went on:

“We can go the long way round – see a bit of Farynshire. Go to the mountains, the big forests, Sylnmouth and Riversouth.”

This was a more attractive prospect. I had spent two years at Rookpot University, and although I felt I had got to know the capital fairly well in that time, I had not explored the county of Farynshire at all. I was studying its history, culture and languages, most of my lecturers had local interest or specialism, and I had visited exhibitions at the Museum, Library and various galleries on the city’s steep slopes. But I had never ventured into the mountains that separated the county from the rest of England, or visited the dramatic coast where Felix was from, or the forests and countryside inbetween.

I didn’t want to spend the summer months waiting at home in Bristol to see if I had made it into the third year (spoiler alert: I did). I needed a distraction.

We used the time between studying for exams, panicking about exams, and taking exams to research our trip.

I had thought that Felix, born and raised in Tor Calon on the coast, would know a lot more about his county than I, a more recent student of its wonders, did. But, as it turned out, I knew more about why Musril was spoken most widely in Riversouth, how Rookpot came to be the capital, and who the robber councillors were. He had heard of all of these things, but they were just background noise to Farynshire natives. This was one of the reasons Felix wanted to travel: I was always educating him on his own county, which he found interesting, but:

“You can’t learn it all from books and museums. You have to go out there and live it.”

I agreed. There were so many places in this small county that I wanted to see – and visiting Felix’s family could be interesting to.

By the time of my last exam (Museums, Masques and Festivities: Cultural Appreciation Throughout the Years) we had a rough itinerary. We did not want details because the whole idea was to be spontaneous and adventurous.